Policy Governance, developed by John Carver, is a cutting edge operating system for Boards of Directors. It focuses on helping the board be accountable to the owners and CEO being accountable to the board. The only complete system of governance known in the world today, Policy Governance offers a rational framework that allows for effective and efficient governing.

About the Carver Policy Governance® Model

This section is designed to help you connect what you know about boards and governance with a premier form of governing, Policy Governance. Information here explains how Policy Governance addresses the needs, challenges and promises of good governance. It will also allow you to assess whether or not it might be right for your board. Please explore!

Note: Keep in mind that the data provides evidence for the interpretation. If the interpretation is assessed as unreasonable, however, it does not matter what sort of data is provided. In that case, the conclusion can only be non-compliance, or possibly partial compliance if the interpretation is reasonable on all policy items except for 1 or 2 lower-level items. Likewise, if the data is inappropriate (not related to the interpretation), it does not matter what the data actually is because it does not apply to the interpretation and so is not worth looking at or judging.

Process Explanation - Two Stages to Compliance Assessment

FIRST STAGE

Interpretation

OPERATIONAL DEFINITION

1. Description reasonable and justified?

2. Measurement system and expected standard of performance (compliance) appropriate to interpretation?

SECOND STAGE

Data

1. Sufficient to meet standard defined in interpretation?

CEO Evaluation
Because the board has set every expectation it has of the CEO in policy that contains particular criteria (Ends policy for outcomes and Executive Limitations policy for operational decisions and conditions), and because it has monitored each of those policies and all of its parts through the year, it has essentially completed its evaluation. True, it has been done in discrete and focused "mini" evaluations, but if summed together it amounts to the board evaluating everything that is expected of the CEO concerning performance Your policy generally says something to this effect: performance of the CEO is made up of production of sufficient Ends as well as avoidance of violation of any Executive Limitations; CEO performance is synonymous with organizational performance.

Because of this there is practically nothing to do other than what has already been done. If the board does anything besides the individual monitoring assessment, the only likely thing remaining is to summarize the results for the year, noting any non-compliances and the status of corrections required by the board in order to detect any pattern.

A form that illustrates this is included below.

Sample CEO Evaluation Worksheet

[Optional] Please review and complete and return to the Board Chair by ________________.

In reviewing and summarizing the CEO’s Monitoring Reports over the year the following is found:

Concerning Ends Achievement:
Percentage of reports found in compliance: _______

Concerning staying within CEO Limitations:
Percentage of reports found in compliance: _______

If there were any out of compliance instances:

Yes

No

The compliance problem was corrected?

_____

_____

The correction occurred in the time agreed upon?

_____

_____

In general:

Yes

No

The reports were presented as scheduled.

_____

_____

The data provided focused on information relevant to proving compliance on the stated criteria

_____

_____

PLEASE CHECK ONE OF THE BELOW AND SIGN

I have reviewed the reports and the data above and have questions or concerns on the following issues or items:____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I have reviewed the following data and have no further questions or concerns.